And here's a little taster of what you can expect from the film, and my review:
Happy End follows three generations of a successful construction dynasty,
but Haneke’s characters are frustrated, bitter and broken right from the
first frames of the film. Anne
(Isabelle Huppert) oversees the business and deals with the fallout from
a construction site accident. Her doctor brother Thomas (Mathieu
Kassovitz) is reconnecting with his teenage daughter, who has come to
live with the family after Thomas’ ex-wife overdoses. Anne’s aging
father Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) has stepped away from the
business as his health is starting to fail. Anne’s son is drinking too
much and appears to be crying out for attention.
It’s a
plot full of major events that mostly happen off screen. A car crash, an
overdose, a suicide attempt and more are involved but Haneke’s focus is
on the quieter moments of relationship drama, including some
surprisingly tender moments of inter-generational mutual understanding
as well as inevitable conflict.
Do you really need three stories for the price of one? Tale of Tales thinks so. I wouldn't mind, but apart from being set in the same world, these three have nothing to do with each other. Pulp Fiction this ain't. This film is completely mad, but not in the most satisfying of ways. Here's the synopsis bit of my review:
Based on a 17th century collection of tales by Italian author
Giambattista Basile, the film features three different storylines, not
all as engaging as each other and never tied together in any
satisfactory way. First up, Salma Hayek and John C. Reilly take centre
stage as the king and queen of a dusty kingdom where all the
entertainers in the land can’t keep the queen from desiring a baby.
After a visit from a mysterious hooded figure who offers them the chance
of creating offspring, Reilly’s devoted king steps up to the plate and
boldly goes to kill off a sea monster in order for his wife to be able
to eat the heart and thus, magically conceive. Needless to say, things
are never this simple and things soon turn awry.
Meanwhile,
Vincent Cassel is a lecherous king who has seemingly used up all the
women in his nearby kingdom and is looking for more playmates to be
debauched with. After hearing a lone beauty singing beneath his castle
walls, he ventures out to find the owner of such a sweet voice. Little
does he know, the voice belongs to one of a pair of ugly old crone
sisters who may or may not have found their way here after auditioning
for Cinderella. Not wanting the king to see them in their decrepit
state, they hide behind the door of their home but the king is nothing
if not persistent. Then things get really weird.
Finally, Toby
Jones is yet another king, whose only daughter he dotes on until the day
he discovers he has a talented flea who has taken a shine to him. While
the flea grows into his beloved pet, his teen daughter wants to find a
prince, but gets more than she bargained for when her father makes a
dubious choice by giving her to an ogre.
